Featured Profiles & News
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Written by Bill Peratt
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There was an early photo of a well publicized on-track incident at Lakeside Speedway that had always intrigued me. That incident involved Vern Grams and Keith Lane with Vern’s car ending up on top of Keith’s car. I’d always wanted to learn more about that incident in general and Vern Grams in particular. A few years ago I was fortunate to have an opportunity to sit down with Vern and his wife Mariann where they shared photos and stories of his racing with me. And yes, he had an 8x10 glossy of that photo, and more. Here then is his racing story.
Vern was originally from the Greeley area. It was 1952, the popularity of stock car racing was booming everywhere, including Greeley, and Vern, just out of the service, like a lot of young guys, went racing.
One of Vern’s early rides was in this car getting sideways just in front of the #11. Things got worse instead of better as Vern took a pretty good tumble. When the car came to a stop, Vern was unconscious and had to be helped from the car. Not really the way he wanted to get started.
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Written by Superstroke
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 Lakeside Speedway was home to many beautiful modified stock cars. One of my personal favorites was this gorgeous 'Vicky'. The 'Golden Chariot', as it was known, was shoed by veteran driver Ed Mailo. The car was built and owned by Ernie Reese and Pat VanDyke. If my memory is correct, Ernie was some sort of engineer. Pat owned and operated A-1 Truck and Auto. Both men were talented mechanics and it showed everytime this beauty entered the track.
The tragedy of this car came in the same year of its existence. Early in that year, and I believe it was in hotlaps, the radiator of the #40 car of Doug Plue ended up sitting right behind Ed Mailo's seat. The car was a total loss.
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Written by Don Burn and Rick Wasilko
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 This is how I got my start in Midget Auto Racing. On Miles Spickler's NU-ENAMEL sponsored Midget 'pit crew' of 1947. That's me all the way to the right in this colorized photo by DUCHESS STUDIO. Don Burn. These wheels aren't chrome. 'Those are Don Burn polish jobs' and I did six of 'em'. They are polished magnesium. Yep, that's how I got my start on Mile's pit crew...polishing mag wheels. ~ Don Burn
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Written by VintageBuzz and Rick Wasilko
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Compton "Comp" Wilson (Berthoud, CO), a dairy farmer by trade, raced at Speedway Park in Fort Collins, CO; at Intermountain Speedway in Cheyenne, WY; and at Englewood Speedway in Englewood, CO.
 The attached photo shows Comp and his "chopped-fendered" Ford coupe in the pits at Speedway Park, circa 1949-1950. Several of the drivers carried that OK Rubber Welders logo on their racecars. For the price back in that era of racing, those OK re-cap racing slicks were very hard to beat.
Comp and Lou Wendzel co-owned some #84 Ford flat-head coupes during the mid-to-late 1950s. Working together, their team won many races and a track championship at Cheyenne's Intermountain Speedway. I'll send more of Lou's photos of their #84 Ford coupes via subsequent postings to ARM.
Later in his racing career, Comp campainged a #84 modified at Englewood Speedway. If anyone has information or photos of Comp's #84 modified, please send them to ARM. ~ VintageBuzz
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Written by Bill Peratt
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During the post WW II era, auto racing of all sorts in the USA was booming. By 1950, stock car racing of the local variety was becoming popular with tracks popping up seemingly everywhere.
Interest in auto racing in the tri-state area would develop as the Interstate Auto Racing Association, and included racing clubs from Cheyenne, Wyoming, Greeley, Loveland and Fort Collins, Colorado. According to the Wyoming Auto Racing Club history book, Speedway Park in Ft. Collins, a one fifth mile paved track, opened in 1950 as the first facility for stock car racing only in this tri-state area.
Among the competitors at Speedway Park was Nebraska’s Vern Westphalen, driving #13. Only black and white photos exist, but presumably this car was green and white, as his later cars were. Green during these early years, at least in stock car racing, didn’t seem to hold the same superstition that it did in other forms of auto racing.
During 1951, Vern also became one of the top drivers at the converted fairgrounds track in Sidney, Nebraska with what appears to be the same ’37 Ford Coupe that he raced at Speedway Park. Here he is on a Sunday afternoon getting his reward for a win. Devils Motor Club official Ed Bauman, still in his Sunday-go-to meetin’ clothes, looks on.
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Written by Rick Wasilko
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 After my first visit with the Legendary Chuck Mauro in 2005, we decided to get together again in late 2006 just to see what Chuck has been 'up to' and how his Midget Number 5 project has progressed since May of 2005. As you can see here, the (now) 90 year old builder and owner of some of the most awesome open wheel racecars in the history of Open Wheel Racing in the United States has progressed very nicely.
Not to give away any 'secrets' here, but Chuck is now working on a very new, fresh project. The restoration and modern day upgrade to the teammate car we see here of his prized 'Esmeralda,' the number 55 team car to this one driven by Bert McNeese.
As always and to this day, anything Chuck builds is clean enough to 'eat spaghetti off of' and is the best equipment to show up at the track.
With that in mind, let's go back a 'couple of' years, and take a look at the Mauro Racing Legacy.
The following was originally written back in 2005, and holds the test of time.
The Mauro Racing Legacy of Colorado...
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